Martin Luther King Timeline

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Civil Rights Leader
1929
January 15 – Michael Luther King Jr. (later known as Martin Luther King Jr.) is born in Atlanta, Georgia to Baptist minister Michael Luther King and schoolteacher Alberta King.

1932

January – King begins nursery school.

1933

Fall – Kings begins first grade.

1934

January – After King’s teacher discovers that he is only five years old, he is expelled from school.

1935

September – King begins second grade.

1942

King begins high school.

1944

September - King begins attending Morehouse College in Atlanta.

1948

February 25 – King is appointed to serve as the assistant pastor at Ebenezer Baptist Church in Atlanta.

June 8 – King graduates from Morehouse with a B.A. in sociology.

September 14 – King begins attending Crozer Theological Seminary in Chester, Pennsylvania.

1951

May – Graduates from Crozer with a bachelor of divinty.

September – Begins studying systematic theology as a graduate student at Boston University.

1953

June 18 – King and Coretta Scott marry at her parent’s home in Marion, Alabama.

1954

September 1 – King is appointed pastor of the Dexter Avenue Baptist Church in Montgomery, Alabama.

1955

June – King earns his Ph.D.

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November 17 – Yoland Denise, King’s first child, is born.

December 1 – Rosa Parks is arrested in Montgomery, Alabama for refusing to give her seat on the bus to a white passenger.

December 5 – King becomes the president of the newly formed Montgomery Improvement Association. The Montgomery bus boycott begins.

1956

January 30 – King’s house is bombed.

December 21 – The Montgomery buses are desegregated.

1957

January – The Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) is formed, and King becomes the president.

February 18 – King is on the cover of Time magazine.

March 6 – Visits Ghana in West Africa.

May 17 – At the Prayer Pilgrimage for Freedom at the Lincoln Memorial, King’s delivers his first national address entitled, “Give Us The Ballot.”

October 23 – King’s second child, Martin Luther King III is born.

1958

June 23 – King meets with President Eisenhower.

September – King’s book, Stride Toward Freedom: The Montgomery Story is published.

September 20 – King is stabbed by a woman while at a book signing in Harlem, New York.

1959

February – King visits India for a month.

1960

February – King and his family move to Atlanta where he serves as assistant pastor to his father at Ebenezer Baptist Church.

October 19 – King is arrested at a sit-in in Atlanta.

1961

January 31 – King’s third child, Dexter is born.

October 16 – King meets with President Kennedy to gain his support for the civil rights movement.

December 16 – King and other protesters are arrested in Albany, Georgia.

1963

King’s second book, Strength to Love is published.

March 28 – King’s fourth child, Bernice Albertine is born.

April – King is arrested after demonstrating in Birmingham, Alabama. While in jail, King writes the widely circulated, “Letter From Birmingham Jail.”

August 28 – King speaks at the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom at the Lincoln Memorial where he delivers his famous “I Have a Dream” speech.

1964

January 18 – King meets with President Lyndon B. Johnson

March 26 – After King’s press conference, he meets Malcolm X.

June – King’s third book, Why We Can’t Wait is published.

June 11 – King is arrested in St. Augustine, Florida for attempting to eat in a white-only restaurant.

December 10 – Wins the Noble Peace Prize.

1965

March 17 – 25 – King and other protestors march from Selma to Montgomery for voting rights.

1966

June 7 - After James Meredith is shot and wounded, King, Floyd McKissick, and Stokely Carmichael resume Meridith’s “March Against Fear” from Memphis to Jackson, Mississippi.

1967

June – King’s fourth book, Where Do We Go From Here? is published.

1968

March 28 – King leads striking sanitation workers in a march in Memphis, Tennessee. The march erupts in violence.

April 3 – Back in Memphis to lead another march with sanitation workers, at a rally at Mason Temple, King delivers his last speech, “I’ve Been to the Mountaintop.”

April 4 - While standing on the balcony of his motel, King is shot and killed.

April 9 – Buried in Atlanta.